The concept of Trinity is conceptualization of certain expressions in the New Testament: Jesus says, I am in the Father and the Father is in me; the Father and I are one. The Father has given all authority to the Son and the Son does what he sees the Father doing. When Jesus was baptized the Spirit of God descended on Jesus and he heard the voice, 'Your are my beloved Son'. At the moment of Jesus transfiguration, God says' he is my beloved Son'. Defining God as Father,Son and the Holy Spirit was later development based on the statements found in the New Testaments.In order to understand Jesus' statements we need to understand his spiritual evolution.
There are many important moments in the life of Jesus. We can take four important moments that are significant in his life before his crucifixion, death and resurrection. The first moment was his birth as a human being through his physical mother, Mary. She conceived him, nourished him, protected him in her physical womb and then gave birth to him as a human being. In that sense Jesus was a hundred percent human being.
The second moment was the day of his circumcision. On the eighth day of his birth Jesus was circumcised according to the Jewish tradition. With this Jesus became a Jew. He was not only a human being but also a Jew. He entered into the collective consciousness of Judaism. He lived like a Jew. He worshiped God like a Jew, he ate like a Jew and he spoke like a Jew. In that sense he was a hundred percent Jew. Judaism was his truth, his way and the model for his life. As a Jew he might have said that Judaism was his way, his truth and his life.
As he grew in his spiritual tradition he began to discover its limitations. Discovering the limitations of ones spiritual tradition is sign of maturity and growth. The first limitation was that his religion, at that time, divided human beings into two: the Jews and the Gentiles. So there was a wall between the Jews and the Gentiles. The second limitation was that God was understood only as the God of the Jews and not of the Gentiles. So there was again a wall between God and the Gentiles. The third limitation was that the external Law took the place of God and human beings were at the service of the Law, or religion. The fourth limitation was that God was a transcendent mystery inaccessible to human beings except through the mediation of the Prophets or the Commandments. The fifth limitation was that his religion created an exclusive collective consciousness thus becoming a source of enmity, conflict and violence.
This realization brought Jesus to the third important moment of his life which was his baptismal experience. The baptismal experience of Jesus was a moment in which he came out of the womb of Judaism and entered into the universal presence of God. It was his spiritual rebirth. First he came out of the physical womb of his physical mother, Mary, and now he came out of his religious womb, Judaism. In this experience the wall between the Jews and the Gentiles was broken down and a new human being was born. It was the birth of a new human consciousness which was united with the whole of humanity and the whole of creation. This new human consciousness was neither a Jew nor a Gentile but the child of God or the Son of God. St. Paul describes this experience very beautifully when he says: for as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew or Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.(Gal.3.27-28). The experience of Jesus at his baptism was the birth of Universal Consciousness which embraced the whole of humanity and the whole of creation. In this experience the wall between God and the Gentiles was also broken down and God became the God of the whole of humanity and of creation and not just the God of the Jews. God was not only a transcendent mystery but also an indwelling presence, Emmanuel. The Spirit of God descended upon Jesus and God lived in him and he lived in God. Jesus said, I am in the Father and the Father is in me (Jn.14.11). He also said: I am the way, the truth and the life. No one can come to the Father but through me (Jn. 14.6-7).
This statement has to be understood in the contest of the New Covenant that God promised to the Jewish people. God gave them Ten Commandments to regulate their lives. But their relationship with God was oscillating between faithfulness and unfaithfulness. It was a turbulent relationship. So God promised that he would make a New Covenant with the people in which he would write the Law in the hearts of the people so that everyone would follow the will of God without being told. (Cf.Jer.31.31-34). It is not really a New Covenant but we can call it eternal covenant written in the heart of human beings when God creates them. In the first covenant God told people what they should and should not do but in the New Covenant God tells who human beings are. That self- knowledge becomes the way, the truth and the life and human beings have to live from this inner wisdom and no more from the external commandments. We can speak of a quantum leap in the divine-human relationship.
The fourth important moment in the life of Jesus was when he grew one step further and realized that God and he were one. He declared: the Father and I are one. This was the last stage of his ascending journey to God. Jesus Christ, not only, entered into our original image and likeness of God but went beyond that and discovered that he was one with God. St. John says, In the beginning was the word, the word was with God and the word was God (Jn.1.1.). At this level Jesus consciousness is one with God and the life he lives is the life of God. At this level God is the way, the truth and the life. We can say that Jesus grew from the individual identity to the collective identity, from the collective to the divine identity. This growth is also the growth in the love of God and the love of neighbor. It begins with the individual love of God and neighbor and grows into the divine love of God and neighbor. Jesus called his experience of God as the kingdom of God. We can use the symbol of a tree. A tree has leaves, branches, trunk and the roots: leaves represent our individual identities, branches represent our collective identities as belief systems, trunk represent universal consciousness(the Son of God) and the roots represent Divine. So Jesus began his journey as a leaf and grow into the awareness of the roots. When Jesus said' I am the Son of God' it represent at the level of the trunk, where he experiences God in him and he in God. It is in this level that the spirit of God descends upon him. When Jesus said, the Father and I are one' it belongs to the highest level of the roots. The Son of God is one who is united with the whole of humanity and creation and lives for them. He also stands before God representing the whole of humanity and creation. He also speaks to the whole of humanity and creation in the name of God. The main principles of Jesus experience, the kingdom of God.
1.there is only on God. This God is greater than religions and human beings.
2. Human beings are not creatures of God but they are manifestations of God. Creation is not a creature of God but a manifestation of God.
3. Human beings, as manifestations of God, can grow in their relationship with God. They can grow from the individual to the collective, from the collective to the universal and finally from the universal to the divine and f discover their oneness with God. It does not mean human beings become another God. there is only one God. it is like a piece of ice melting into the ocean of Divine.
4. Belief systems are meant to be at the service of human beings and not human beings at the service of belief systems.
The other aspect of the Trinity is that: human life is relationships. It is in relationships that we should experience God;it is in giving and relationship we unfold our life.
